The present invention relates to a hand tool for dispensing plastic fasteners, and more particularly to a novel plastic fastener dispensing hand tool that prevents inadvertent user needle sticks by employing a unique needle anvil and a needle having a unique casing.
Plastic fasteners comprising an elongated flexible filament with a first enlargement at one end of the flexible filament and a second enlargement at the opposite end are well-known in the art and widely used in commerce. Plastic fasteners of this type are commonly used to maintain certain articles of clothing (i.e. men's dress shirts) in a folded condition so as to minimize any wrinkling of the article and so as to present the article in an otherwise flattering manner. A plastic fastener dispensing hand tool (commonly referred to as a “tagging gun”) having an unexposed articulating needle is used to dispense plastic fasteners to maintain certain articles of clothing in a folded condition. Tagging guns having an unexposed articulating needle are well known, examples of such tools including those disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,267,285, 6,837,413, and 7,331,497.
The design of known tagging guns presents several operating issues. First, the design of known tagging guns leaves a large gap between the wall of the tagging gun that the needle articulates from and the anvil into which the needle articulates. This large gap allows for the inadvertent entrance of an operator's finger or hand into the gap. This is undesirable, as the tagging gun may accidentally be actuated while the operator's finger or hand is in the gap, thereby causing the needle to articulate from the tagging gun and into the operator's hand resulting in operator injury. Second, the procedure for replacing the needle of known tagging gun designs further lends to the possibility of operator injury. To replace the needle of known tagging guns, the operator is required to grasp the needle directly. Because the needle of the tagging gun is both small and located in a tightly confined area within the tagging gun, a high level of dexterity is required to grasp the needle. An operator may find difficulty in grasping the needle, and there exists a high probability that an operator may accidentally stick himself or herself with the needle as the operator struggles to remove the needle from the tagging gun. Third, the design of known tagging guns does not permit an operator to precisely see where the needle will penetrate the article of clothing when the tagging gun is actuated. This is problematic, as the operator may secure a plastic fastener to an incorrect location on the article of clothing. The operator would then be required to carefully remove the incorrectly placed plastic fastener, taking care not to damage the article of clothing, and then place an additional plastic fastener in the correct location on the article of clothing. Such operation wastes both time and resources, and furthermore increases the likelihood that the article of clothing may become damaged.
Therefore, what is needed is an improved tagging gun that reduces the risk of operator injury while also increasing the accuracy of plastic fastener placement.